When you work out in the gym, you don’t think about injuries, although every bodybuilder has had an injury at least once in their gym life. No one can be sure to avoid injuries during workouts, but there are some rules every bodybuilder should follow when striving for a muscular physic. Knowing and following them may significantly reduce the risk of injuries in the gym. You surely know most of them, but ignore them from time to time. Please, don’t.
Safe Workouts Rule 1. Warm-up
The first rule to prevent injuries is warming up. Before starting your workouts in the gym take enough time to warm your body up. This raises body temperature, prepares the joints for the workout and gets your metabolism into gear. In the first place this concerns beginners and those experienced bodybuilders, who may rarely, but still feel a bit lazy for workouts. They are in the risk group. Here’s the list of things to do in the gym before training enough to reduce the risk of injuries:
- 10 minutes of cardio on a treadmill or bike,
- 5 minutes of light stretching,
- a pair of light sets before “harder” ones.
Safe Workouts Rule 2. Stretch before, during and after Training
If you don’t stretch before workouts, you compromise your health, as in this case your joints and muscles are more stressed and are much more vulnerable. Stretching muscles means making them more flexible, and this will also make your workouts safer and more effective. Before starting to train, stretch all muscles you are going to work at.
By the way, stretching between sets is also very good, as it provides your muscles with more nutrients, which stimulate them to grow faster. It gives your body some rest necessary for the next set.
Well stretching after workouts helps recover faster and prevent myalgia. Don’t forget this too.
Safe Workouts Rule 3. Control Your Workouts
It’s always been so tempting to load up the big weight or to cheat your way through the set, right? You may turn to intensity boosting, some day all bodybuilders do it, but it always has to be controlled. You may start cheating only after your normal set is done. Don’t use too much weight. Avoid any kinds of bouncing, jerking or partial moves forced by necessity.
Safe Workouts Rule 4. Keep a Good Muscle Strength Balance
There’re many bodybuilders, who are stronger in one side, because they are, for example, right-handed, like most people. Some bodybuilders pay more attention to only one muscle group in the gym ignoring the other one. In this case we are happy to see those monkeys with very strong arms and skinny legs. Here’re a few simple, but useful tips to avoid <a href=’https://www.tpxmuscle.com/2016/11/build-muscle-strength.html’ target=’_blank’>muscle strength</a> disbalances:
- if you’re right-handed, do a bit more repetitions with your left arm,
- keep a good balance of using dumbbells and barbells,
- look at yourself in the full-length mirror more often.
Safe Workouts Rule 5. Get in the Training Mood
When you are working out in the gym, make sure you are thinking only about this. Don’t start to train without the right mood, as thoughts, that may draw your attention away from training, are a great risk factor of injuries. In order to get motivated try some autogenic training techniques or just think about your goal and all the things that go with its achievement.
These five safe workouts rules won’t guarantee a totally injury-free training, but will surely reduce the injury risk. Just get the habit of doing all this, and there’ll be fewer obstacles in your journey to a muscular physic.
